eBay Scandal Coming Soon

[qruthie]

I sell a lot of items on ebay. I haven't sold anything VMK yet and don't plan to. My understanding of PayPal transactions is that even shipping to a confirmed address can be a problem if the buyer displutes the charges. And there are other reasons for disputing charges than claiming they didn't receive the item. For example, the buyer can dispute the charges if the item doesn't match what was described in the listing. I saw a case on some court tv show where an item was sold "as is" but the ebay description had indicated it was made of one type of metal when it was actually made of a different type of metal. The judge ruled in favor of the buyer.

I know of one case where a person shipped an expensive item to a confirmed PayPal address and the buyer disputed the charges, I think they claimed they didn't receive the item. The seller had proof of delivery but PayPal still removed the funds from the seller's PayPal account. My understanding is they didn't withdraw the money from the seller's bank account, instead the seller had a huge negative balance on their PayPal account. I don't know if or how the case was ever resolved. This was a few years ago and the last I heard, the buyer still had the item and their money and PayPal wasn't helping the seller at all.

 

[BriarRosie]

My only sour experience as an eBay buyer happened years ago, and I
never knew how to dispute this with eBay at the time. (I believe 1998.)

I paid for the goods, had them insured by the seller, and the piece (it was
the WDCC Cruella) arrived broken due to really poor packaging on the
seller's part. I told the seller he needed to file the claim with the USPS,
but he never did, and I surrendered my broken piece at the local post office.

So the seller got my money, I got a broken piece AND then surrendered
it to the post office. I was out somewhere between $100-200 dollars,
and I feel stupid for not knowing how to get that resolved.

 

[DaraAllen]

I buy a lot of stuff from eBay, and have done so for years. My only negative experience was when a seller's privileges were yanked by eBay. I received an e-mail instructing me on how to file a claim and all that. After about a week or so I was told that they had been unsuccessful in contacting the seller, yada yada ya.

Bottom line is that they kept my money and I never got the product.

 

[koolashley]

Thx for posting this! You are a very good person to do something like this. Anyway, I wouldn't even want to sell stuff on eBay. Just give it to your friends that know about VMK, too. DON'T DO STUFF LIKE THAT!!!!!!

 

[mtlhddoc2]

I have been on ebay almost since the beginning. I have never been conned, scammed or lost money. I have had buyers file claims, I have also had sellers not deliver. I never loose because I am always in the right. If I ship something that arrives damaged, I refund the money if the buyer insured it. If it does not arrive, same thing. I bought a bunch of Disney Plates and Snowglobes about a year ago - total was about $350 - well, apparently the guy skipped town - I filed a paypal claim, and won, all money refunded. Paypal then filed charges against him in the place where he had set up shop. He was caught and did time.

I had a buyer file a claim against me, not with paypal, with his credit card company. and THAT is where you need more proof for, credit card companies just chargeback immediately and ask questions later. Anyway, he lost because I had the proof.

Moral of the story, be smart, keep all correspondence with sellers and with buyers for at least 6 months, regardless of what you are selling or buying.

 

[qruthie]

I've been on ebay since October 1997, I guess that's close to being there from the beginning. Anyway, I have only been scammed once but that seller wasn't very bright so his buyers shared details and were able to track him down and send his local police department to his home. That scared him enough to get him to refund our money. The police officer handling the case was pretty blunt though, he said we probably would have been out of luck if the guy hadn't been scared by the police showing up at his door. Even though it was mail fraud and across state lines, it was highly unlikely the Post Master General would have done anything because the total amount of money lost was comparatively small. Apparently, they only had the resources to go after the really big scammers. This was long before PayPal existed and the buyers had paid with money orders.

I have definitely been mislead by listings, especially in the beginning when it was rare to have a picture in the listing, but for the most part I have dealt with very nice and honest people. I buy and sell. I'm currently dealing with an ebay/PayPal issue that isn't a hacked account but it might as well be. Somehow the wrong address was linked to the account. Ebay fixed the problem but after I had already shipped the item to the wrong address. The transaction still isn't 100% resolved but we are getting there.

 

[hdmonkeybug]

What's worse than getting banned? Getting ripped off. Of real money.

I cannot disclose why or how, but it has come to my attention that there is an eBay buyer out there paying for some of the more expensive rare VMK items via an unconfirmed Paypal account, and doing 100% of the transaction via the Internet. And the codes they buy, and trades they arrange in the game, are going to someone with a different name than the name of the person who has the Paypal account.

If any DISers out there sell VMK cards (I can't really tell if selling the cards is against VMK values, because those just say you can't sell a character or account) on eBay, watch out for anyone who tries to buy your stuff in exchange for a Paypal payment with an unconfirmed shipping address. If you email the codes and the payment account turns out to be hacked, Paypal can debit the proceeds from your account, or (if you already spent the money) sue you to get the cash back, and all you can do about it is try to track down the scammer via electronic records. Paypal is clear about its policies. You sell to an unconfirmed Paypal account, you ship at your own risk.

Some ppl might think this is cool, since they don't agree with letting ppl sell VMK cards or virtual items on eBay, but nobody deserves to get ripped off, ever.

I understand the whole unconfirmed address thing and how it it is not safe to ship to unconfirmed addresses. However, what you have described here does not sound like a scam to me. Has there ever been a charge reversal claimed on these transactions from the buyer? It could be as simple as a parent buying items for their child. The fact that the name is different on the ebay account then on vmk, does not necessarily mean scam. Could it just be someone buying gifts for someone else?

 

[darkacre]

I understand the whole unconfirmed address thing and how it it is not safe to ship to unconfirmed addresses. However, what you have described here does not sound like a scam to me. Has there ever been a charge reversal claimed on these transactions from the buyer? It could be as simple as a parent buying items for their child. The fact that the name is different on the ebay account then on vmk, does not necessarily mean scam. Could it just be someone buying gifts for someone else?

I just saw this on eBay. It's feedback left by the buyer for the seller, saying that the seller saved the buyer from having a hacker get his VMK codes. I don't know if this is related or unrelated to the other incident.

http://feedback.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewFeedbackMemberLeft&memberid=vmkstar!&items=-1&item=120029450330&de=off

 

[allyoopcat]

I don't and never will participate in that kind of stuff but they sell game cheats and codes and players and all kinds of different types of virtual stuff on ebay all the time. There are a lot of other games that have this problem as well. I think it would be a rip off.